


Check and Mate

by NoelleAngelFyre



Series: The Game [15]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, Gotham (TV)
Genre: Aftermath of trauma, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Background, Dysfunctional Family, F/M, Family Dynamics, Father-Daughter Relationships, Gen, Mob Wars, Poisoning, Revenge is best served cold, Turf wars
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-13
Updated: 2016-09-13
Packaged: 2018-08-14 21:33:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,306
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8029627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NoelleAngelFyre/pseuds/NoelleAngelFyre
Summary: "You are as you have always been: an alien specimen, a parasite, who has invaded my city.  It will remain in your hands, by your next choice, whether or not you are given a little place to nest, or whether I feed you to my child."





	Check and Mate

**Author's Note:**

> I suppose now would be as good a time as any to put up the disclaimer: "I own no characters, plot elements, or details associated with Gotham and/or the Batman franchise. I own only my original characters, created for purposes of this series."
> 
> ...that's about all I've got. Please enjoy.

Gabe moves first. Butch—contrary to his height and girth—moves faster.

“Keep it cool, buddy.” He murmurs, as if affectionately greeting an old friend. In some aspects, he supposes as much is true. He grew rather fond of Gabe during his short tenure with Penguin. The guy isn’t much for brains, but he’s tough as nails and what he lacks in intelligence he makes up for in creativity. And he’s a damn fine hand at poker. They wasted away many good hours over cards and beer. Butch would be lying to pretend he doesn’t sometimes miss those days.

“Outta the way, Butch.” Gabe retorts, unmoved by the gun quietly nestled against his gut. “Some of us still know what loyalty means.”

“See, there’s something we can agree on.” Butch nods eagerly. To the far right of his peripheral, he can see Miss DeLaine at the table. The air between her and the other woman is light, friendly, broken by little bursts of tinkling laughter. He’s hardly worried about something going south—at least for now. “Now, here’s what’s gonna happen: you and me are going to shoot the breeze for a while, real cool, like the old days. The ladies are going to finish their drinks and their chit-chat. And then, when your boss comes downstairs, you’re gonna take the nice old lady back home while your boss and mine have a different kind of chat.”

“And I’m supposed to buy that, huh?” Gabe huffs, already looking fit to knock Butch’s teeth in. “The broad’s just gonna let Mrs. K. walk out of here, scot free?”

“The boss likes Mrs. K. Can’t you tell?” as if to support him, another bout of shared laughter breaks from the far table, and he’s pretty sure the old lady just took hold of Miss DeLaine’s hand like a mother to her daughter. “Besides, unlike _your_ boss, mine doesn’t screw with loved ones.”

Gabe’s bravado falters, just a bit. He falls silent, shifts in place, then swallows. He almost looks guilty. “I told the boss to let me handle it. Knew those dumb kids were sooner to shoot their own feet off before they got the job done.”

“He should’ve listened.”

“…Yeah.” Gabe nodded slowly. “Yeah, guess he should’ve.”

Butch weighs the option for a minute before holstering his gun. Honor among thieves, or something like that. Or maybe it’s just this odd shared notion of loyalty that keeps him from dropping Gabe like a rat. Besides, if this all goes south, he’s got half a mind to see if the boss will take Gabe on. He likes the old boy.

For the sake of appearances, Gabe offers him a beer. He takes a sip then puts it aside. On the clock, he’s got to be sober as a judge. Off the clock, he can drink himself into a stupor and the boss won’t even blink. He and the boys get into drinking contests all the time—which, now that he thinks about it, really shouldn’t happen. He’s probably hacked off half his brain cells by now.

The ladies are chatting in some European language—German, maybe? Foreign talk was never his strongest point—and having a gay old time. Ten minutes in, Gabe clears his throat and drops an idle, “That a new suit?”

Butch grins and flexes his arms a bit, just for the full effect. “Not too bad, huh?”

It’s his favorite suit, actually: black-pearl with thin pinstripe, tailored to fit like a glove, and today he’s paired it with a sharp purple (ladies call it “eggplant”; he personally prefers to not feel like he’s wearing a vegetable) shirt and sleek grey tie. The purchase, along with six other suits, occurred about two months ago. It was a bonding experience, inasmuch as men bond, with Dimitri. The kid may be a walking bean-pole, but he knows his way around a tailor shop.

“Look like you outta be drinking a martini in that thing.” Gabe smirks, but fondly. The scene is starting to settle into familiar territory, and Butch intends to make the most of it before things start a downward spiral.

“Not a chance.” He lifts the beer high and proud. “A man’s gotta stay loyal to his drink. Sometimes it’s the only thing still there at the end of the day.”

“We’ll drink to that.” Gabe nods, clinks their bottles together, and takes a healthy swig next to Butch’s modest sip.

The conversation abruptly switches back to English, with another burst of laugher from Mrs. K. “Oh, you!” she lightly swats the air, still giggling—Butch privately wonders what, exactly, is in that glass—and then takes hold of Miss DeLaine’s hand. “Such a pretty creature. You have very lucky man wearing your ring.”

His eyes are sharp-tuned these days, and he sees the tiny ripple pass along her jaw before a sweet smile curves her lips. “Yes, I do.”

“Are you pregnant yet?” Mrs. K. inquires further, eyes dropping to the toned belly beneath dark blue fabric, and Butch’s suspicions about the lady’s drink-of-choice are growing. Or maybe she’s just that tactless. He can’t quite remember.

Iris shakes her head, still smiling like a champ—Bless her heart—and Mrs. K. waves a wild hand that’s a little too dramatic to be sober. “Not to worry. You make beautiful babies, very soon.”

It’s a good time for the old gal to take another generous drink; it means she doesn’t see Miss DeLaine’s smile waver and her gaze drop to the table for a heavy moment. Poor kid. He suddenly wishes there had been some kind of renowned doctor on Falcone’s payroll, or even Fish’s, but the only white-coats Fish ever had around were in her bed, and they were a bunch of hacks anyway. Not the kind of people you trust with something so delicate.

He wonders if Gordon might know anyone, so Miss DeLaine could stop carrying this burden alone, but convincing him to help Mr. Zsasz might be a project in and of itself. And by the time any kind of resolution was found…it might be too late. If it isn’t already.

“Mother,” Penguin’s voice cuts sharply through the air; Butch and Gabe share one final look and a heavy sigh before looking across the room. The dark-haired King is standing at the lowest step, hands locked rigid at his sides, pale eyes sharp and furious, and his thin lips mangled in a very unpleasant expression, “ _what_ are you doing?”

Show time.

***

“Slow—slow down.” Jim is saying, phone balanced between his ear and shoulder with simultaneously trying to drop the heavy mass of files in his free arm; Edward takes pity and quickly rushes to his rescue, for which he earns an openly relieved expression and gracious smile from the detective before Jim resumes a more serious look. “Selina, just calm down. What’s wrong? Where’s Iris?”

Edward’s intentions of returning to the morgue for some catch-up work on reports are tossed out the proverbial window. He swivels mid-step, darts back to Jim’s desk, and attempts to loiter inconspicuously. He knows it’s not working: Detective Bullock is giving him a rather unnecessarily dirty look, but Jim is focused on his phone call and if he’s bothered by anything, there’s no given indication of it.

Jim listens silently for approximately thirty-two seconds, then all-but leaps out of his chair. “What do you mean, she—when? When did she—?” Twelve more seconds. “No. _No_. I don’t care if I’m not your dad, young lady, I said _no_. You stay there with Bruce and Alfred.” Now he’s pulling the right-side desk drawer open, withdrawing his gun, and holstering it with one hand. “I’ll handle this. Just calm down, alright? Everything will be fine.”

As soon as the call ends, Detective Bullock opens his mouth. Edward takes opportunity as it arrives and leaps to the forefront. “What can I do, Detec—I mean…what can I do, Jim?”

Permission to refer to Detective Gordon on a first-name basis came nine days ago. Detective Bullock openly disapproves, and hasn’t been shy about saying so (verbally or otherwise) ever since. It was a surprise gift, the kind most children are supposed to receive on Christmas morning or for their birthdays (he wouldn’t know, either way), and he accepted with eager hands, even if old habits are hard to break. Jim’s name is less of a mouthful than his proper title, which is a relief for his tongue, and Edward likes the way it breaks the air in a single syllable. Strong. Simple. A sharp burst of air past the teeth, clicking off the tongue. It’s a most pleasant experience.

“I don’t know yet, Ed.” Jim answers, in what might be the most openly concerned display he’s ever given the public viewer. “All I know is, right now, I have to make sure my daughter doesn’t kill someone.”

“I’d be more worried about _her_ getting offed.” Detective Bullock says, unhelpfully; Edward surprises himself with the dirty look he throws the older man.

“Iris is too smart.” He declares, without waver; fond memories play across his inner eye, and the idea—the _suggestion_ —that Iris could ever be so careless as to walk into her own deathtrap is insulting, and he’s quite certain Jim throws him a grateful little half-smile en route to the door. “No one stands a chance against her.”

***

It’s moments like this which serve to reinforce Butch’s understanding of just why Miss DeLaine plays chess so often. That’s really all this is: chess. A different board set-up, absent a few players here and there, but what it boils down to is exactly the game’s purpose. On one side, the king and his knight (Reggie, a hired gun with a fondness for black leather on his jacket and on his women). On the other, the queen and her rook (Butch has never really seen himself as a knight, and the rook can crush through reinforcements with a single blow). There have been plenty of “checks”—violent ones at that—in this game so far, but tonight (God willing, because he’s not sure how much more of this anyone can take) there will finally be a “mate”.

Of course, Penguin looks fit to explode right now, so maybe he’ll do them all a favor and “mate” himself.

These last few days haven’t been particularly kind to the little bird. His ordinarily well-kept hair is an unruly mess, there are heavy shadows under his eyes, and a good meal wouldn’t hurt. Miss DeLaine has had equally sleepless nights, but rather than work against her, the dark shadows and tight draw of skin over bone works in her favor…to an extent.

She looks wild: blue eyes much too bright amidst dark shadows, hair a thick shroud around her sharp features, hands long and thin and pale and looking more like claws resting atop the polished wood surface (the length of her nails doesn’t help). She’s cold as ice, furious, and the tension between them is a true ticking time bomb.

This isn’t going to be pretty.

“How _dare_ you,” Penguin starts, right off the bat, righteous fury, indignant, whole nine yards, “come in here and accost my mother like that? If you think you’ll get away with this—”

“—Oh, shut up.” Miss DeLaine snaps—no, his mistake; there’s no other way to describe that sound than a snarl, the kind you’d hear out of a starving wolf ready to rip a throat out. “I have no interest in your mother, Penguin. _Yours_ is the neck I intend to snap, not hers.”

Penguin locks his jaw, and then, in a highly immature gesture, reaches across the table, empties Iris’ untouched glass in a single draw, and proceeds to drop it on the floor. The sound of crystal fragments shattering left and right echoes in the air for a minute or two. Now Penguin is giving Iris a cocky little glare (Butch has a couple fantasies about rearranging it with his fist) while she sits perfectly still. A rock could take lessons from this woman.

“Was that little display intended to cow me down, Penguin?” she finally asks. Her tone’s rocking the same temperature as the Arctic Tundra, and now even Reggie’s getting a little squirmy. “Small wonder you hired empty-headed ruffians to do your work. No man worth his skill would be impressed by you.”

A muscle starts twitching in Penguin’s jaw. “You,” he whispers, voice quivering like a tortured violin string, “impertinent, arrogant, conceited little—”

“I would save your breath, little bird,” she murmurs, “you may find a use for it in ten minutes, before your throat starts closing up. Arsenic poisoning is a slow death, after all.”

The room falls silent, but Butch has a feeling a bomb just went off. He’s been under two of Gotham’s most colorful characters (Fish being the more colorful, without competition). He saw men come and go under Falcone’s reign. He watched Fish go through men like luxury dinner spreads (slow, savored with deliberate enjoyment, and then tossed out with the trash). He was there when Falcone hired Victor Zsasz, and it’s a day he’ll remember until the day Miss DeLaine buries him six feet under: the way Zsasz carved a man like fresh butter, with a stomach-churning look of delight etched across his face, and then politely waited for Falcone to pass judgment.

He knew then, beyond a doubt, what kind of man Victor Zsasz was. And the memory of their first meeting had been with Butch when Falcone neatly deposited him and Fish into Zsasz’ eagerly-waiting claws. There was blood in the man’s dark blue eyes, and sadism in a smile much too broad and much too white. Butch knew, in that moment, what fate awaited him.

Now, things are different. He’ll always be loyal to both (Zsasz out of obligation and allegiance sworn in his spilt blood), but Miss DeLaine will always hold the greater of his love. She saved him.

Now, she inspires him. Without as much as a blink, she promises death without a cure. He wonders, silently, without a twitch of facial muscles to betray him, if she’s truthful. Maybe it’s just a clever scheme. Maybe…

Penguin’s mouth twists in, yet again, an unpleasant expression. “I’ll call your bluff and spare you further embarrassment, _my dear_.” Butch feels a clench in his jaw; that’s meant to be a term of endearment, and now it’s been thrown at Miss DeLaine like someone throws a stray dog a bone. “Or do you expect me to believe you’re brazen enough to kill me under my own roof, in front of my own men?”

“The two you still have.” Butch says. When he was with Fish, there were rules about when he could and couldn’t speak. Miss DeLaine doesn’t have those rules. She has different rules, but none that make him hold his tongue. He enjoys this freedom often, but not nearly as much as he is right now, watching Penguin’s smirk dissolve into something less cocky.

Miss DeLaine remains unamused. She’s beyond calm confidence. She’s beyond one-uping this man. She is angry. Cold, deadly, leave-no-trace-behind, angry.

“Brazen.” She echoes, quietly, fingers laced, elbows neatly propped on the table. “You accuse me of being _brazen_. You opened fire on a crowded street. You have murdered over a _dozen_ innocent people. You have taken husbands from their wives, daughters and sons from their parents. You have ripped into this city’s sense of security—the thin, fraying thread it was—like the clumsy, graceless, incompetent, crippled, weak little _scrap_ of existence you are. You want to accuse me of bluffing? Of lying? Go ahead. But while you are calling me a liar, ask yourself why I would not be telling the truth. You, Oswald Cobblepot, are a plague and a poison in this city. And nothing would give me greater pleasure than to eradicate every last trace of the man who is destroying my city and who tried to kill my husband.”

What little remains of Penguin’s cocky assurance is rapidly plummeting. That time bomb is ticking hard and fast now. Explosion is imminent.

“Perhaps I did you a favor.” Penguin says, very slowly; there’s a distinct change in his voice that raises Butch’s hackles and brings a hand protectively over his gun. “Perhaps you are so deluded by this so-called affection for Victor that you don’t realize what I’ve saved you from.”

Now, Miss DeLaine’s lips thin into a bitterly-cold smile. “Are you implying I do not know who and what he is, Penguin?” she asks, in a matching tone. “Because if you are, then it quite stands to reason you do not know as much as you claim. If you did, you would know just how Victor and I met, and you would waste neither my time nor your breath with these inane accusations.”

“Fine.” Penguin replies, and in the rapid succession of seconds to follow—during which the dark-haired man pulls a gun from God-knows-where, Butch yanks his own from the holster and aims it for Reggie before Reggie can do anything with his own piece, and Miss DeLaine remains sitting with barely a blink—the time bomb officially goes off. “Then let’s make the headlines together, my dear girl. _King and Queen Fallen in Tragic Display._ It has a certain romanticized air to it, don’t you think?”

“Never had a taste for that sort of thing.” Jim Gordon’s voice precedes him by about two seconds. When he does appear, it’s with sidearm drawn and in direct aim for the back of Penguin’s head. “Drop the gun, Penguin, or I drop you.”

***

He’s probably pissed off half the drivers in Gotham this evening, but frankly, speed limits and road rules are irrelevant when someone says your daughter is entering the lions’ den—especially when she wants the lion’s head on a platter.

He also might have clipped a couple patrol cars while peeling out of the precinct. It’ll come out of his paycheck. Who the hell cares?

The scene he’s walked into isn’t a mess yet, but it is one itchy trigger finger away from becoming colossal chaos. As a cop, Jim knows he’s treading on paper-thin ice and should proceed with absolute caution. Talk everyone down. Try to settle this with perfect civility, a stellar demonstration of his negotiation skills, and let everyone go home tonight in one piece.

As a father…there’s a man pointing a gun at Iris’ head. There’s really only one thing to do.

“Walk away, Jim.” Penguin says; his voice is shaking, trembling with anger and a whole lot of other things. Unfortunately, the grip he has on the gun isn’t even wiggling.

“I said, drop the gun.” Over the smaller man, his gaze briefly meets Iris’. As tight and ragged as she’s appeared for days, as furious and (unquestionably) dangerous as she looked when he first glimpsed her, five minutes ago, she looks different now. Her blue eyes are softer, wider as they look at him. She’s staring as though she’s never seen him before. As if this is the first time she’s really, truly, honestly seen him.

Maybe it is.

“Shoot me or walk away!” Cobblepot snaps; now his hand shakes, but doesn’t waver off course. “You don’t get to keep protecting her, Jim! Take off your rose-colored glasses and see her for who and _what_ she is!”

“She’s my daughter.” Jim whispers, less for the surrounding company and more for the blue eyes gazing at him— _inside_ him—with frail innocence, with an absolute terror splayed across her face. Not fear of the gun or some terrible retribution, but something else.

He wonders, in a sudden burst of curiosity, if she’s afraid of him. Of the words he’s saying. Of the promises and vows he’s making.

“This girl,” Penguin’s voice is shaking violently now, as is the gun in his hand; Jim has been in enough hostage situations, on the force and in the army, to know the mounting tension and erratic emotional behavior isn’t doing any favors for anyone, and now is when his negotiating skills would have come in handy, “is a killer. Not that you should be surprised, Jim: she _was_ trained by the best. Don Falcone didn’t hire just anyone. He hired Victor Zsasz, the one person in Gotham who carved a man up like a turkey and enjoyed every minute of it. Just like, no doubt, dear Iris here enjoyed every minute she spent killing her abductor. _If_ , that is, she was even abducted.”

“Stop.” Jim says, but it’s too quiet, not enough conviction, because he’s less concerned about raising his voice and far more concerned with what just appeared from the shadows and is quickly approaching. If there is poison in Penguin’s system—he’s not willing to assume one way or another right now—it might not be what kills him.

“Why don’t you tell us all the truth, Iris?” Penguin hisses, glaring poisonously across the table. “Were you really kidnapped? Or were you just bored with Victor? I hear the man you were with had a particular fascination with knives. Slicing up pretty young women. Did he teach you better? Was he better than Victor? I imagine—”

Jim is obliged to look away half a second before the scream rips through the air. It’s not professional, by any means; as a cop, he should have been proactive, addressed the new threat before anything more came of it. But he didn’t. Maybe this is proof he’s finally been corrupted by Gotham, so thoroughly that he truly turns a blind eye to this wretched ugliness. Maybe he’s officially become so weak, so pitiful, so spineless that he needs to turn his badge in now.

Maybe…maybe a part of him wanted to hurt Penguin, enough to make him scream and feel a fraction of the pain he’s caused Jim.

He fears it’s the latter. Which makes him, by default, indebted to the man presently standing with one hand in Penguin’s hair, yanking it back hard enough that his neck is in danger of snapping, and the other one holding a knife embedded so deep in Penguin’s hand, Jim’s waiting for it to appear on the table underside.

_There_ ’s a debt he’ll be swallowing for the rest of his days.

“I imagine,” Zsasz whispers, twisting the knife slightly to the left, “it’s time for you to stop talking.”

The man looks like Hell just chewed him up and spit him across a boiling lake. He’s practically half-dressed, scars on prominent display; eyes rimmed red and shadowed so heavily they look like bruises; his skin is stretched tight across the bones, and his teeth are bared in an exceptionally unpleasant vision. He resembles Death, the Grim Reaper, in every nightmarish detail.

It is a cold and bitter pill to swallow, to look at this man and know Iris has chosen him as her lover, her lifelong mate. For a fleeting moment, Jim think perhaps he can divide them as separate entities, or that maybe—a fool’s wish, to be sure—this horrific sight is enough to rip Iris back to her senses, if she ever was truly out of them to begin with.

But no.

Iris rises from her seat with the grace and deadly gaze of a cobra. Three deliberate steps bring her to Zsasz’s side; she delicately curls one hand around the fist burying a knife in Penguin’s hand, and the change is unmistakable. The nightmare doesn’t end, but tension ripples away from the man’s frame. Two pairs of shadowed blue eyes meet in a gaze that allows no interpretation for the message exchanged. But their eyes speak to each other, make no mistake: in the time it takes Jim to blink, Zsasz dislodges the knife from Penguin’s hand and, with a vicious slice of motion through air, flings it forward. Penguin’s last remaining guard—Reggie, he thinks?—chokes briefly, then blood gurgles deep, around the blade lodged deep in his throat, and he drops heavily to the floor.

“A little biology lesson you might find useful, little bird.” Iris says, voice like ice, or maybe acid (he can’t decide which). “The human body can indeed ingest arsenic at varying levels. It is, of course, not without some side effects. Right about now, you are feeling quite nauseous, feverish, and physically depleted. These symptoms will continue throughout the week, perhaps a bit longer, increasing in intensity, while the poison works its way through your system. You will be quite bedridden, and otherwise incapable of doing anything about it.”

She takes another step closer to Zsasz. “In the meantime, I will take back every last property you stole from my uncle. I will solidify my rightful claim over all that is in the DeLaine and Falcone name. And when you stumble out of your bed, weak and physically drained from your own arrogance, you will find yourself as you have always been: an alien specimen, a parasite, who has invaded my city. It will remain in your hands, by your next choice, whether or not you are given a little place to nest, or whether I feed you to my child, just as I did your incompetent, foul-tongued assassin-for-cheap-hire.”

The exit is swift and without pause: Iris and Zsasz, the latter after retrieving his bloodied knife and sheathing it at his waist, then Gilzean with a parting nod to Jim. The silence that falls next is heavy, broken by tight, erratic breaths from the man trying to staunch the blood flowing from his hand. Jim sighs, shakes his head, and meets Penguin’s gaze.

“Don’t say I didn’t warn you.” He says, and walks out.

***

Alexander has plenty of words for her, in fevered Russian, as soon as she gets one foot over the threshold. Mostly out of respect for his place as her remaining uncle, and acknowledgement that she scared him half-witless with such abrupt departure, she retires with him to the study and lets him say his piece. It takes two hours, maybe a little while longer, all the while watching him pace unsteadily before the hearth (he’s clearly been enjoying the liquor cabinet tonight) with both hands waving and sweeping at random.

At some point, her attention slips away. The desire to bury herself away, somewhere that isn’t here, that isn’t with people to invade her space and make their demands, where distractions are wanted and sought with eager hands, in a city that isn’t rotted from the core and steadily destroying itself from the inside and outside. It starts as a fleeting fancy, then quickly builds to something more; to a pressing desire that’s fit to drive her mad if she doesn’t take herself to such a place, now.

“I need to go away.” She says, nearly at the start of hour three, cutting abruptly into Alexander’s furious raving about little birds and his desire to break bones. He stops, jaw hanging loose for a moment, then clears his throat.

“Away?”

“Yes.” She whispers, disregarding the frantic warnings against impulsivity. “I…I need to leave. I need to go somewhere that is not here. Somewhere far from Gotham.”

He isn’t pleased, she can tell. He attempts to argue bad timing, but she reminds him contrary, citing Penguin’s present state of incapacitation and the capability of the Orlov brothers to maintain the clan in her absence. He then argues her mental state—as though he’s the one with a psychology degree—to which her most polite answer is to defend her mental capacity and promise she is most certainly in the best state of mind to make decisions.

She’s not sure about the “best state of mind” part, but she is confident in this decision.

Then, true to form, Alexander drops the one argument she hasn’t prepared for. “Tiger is not well.” He says.

“The wounds will heal.” She says, remotely pleased in her uncle’s immediate assumption that this trip will not be taken alone. “Some time away, where he can relax, is what Victor needs most.”

Alexander scowls. “She-Wolf,” he says, heavily, “Tiger is not well in head.”

Her fingers lock around the armrests. Before a rebuttal can follow, he continues in the same tone. “Bullets did not kill body, but did kill man. Now, all is left is half-animal. Wild. Dangerous. Unstable. Should not be near him.”

Her throat is more content, apparently, to close in and strangle every breath, word, and sigh she might otherwise try to force out. When she finally does succeed in speaking, her tone is weak, breathless, and the conviction she hopes for isn’t there. “I am not afraid of him.” She whispers. She knows half of that is a lie; she wonders if, maybe, all of it is a lie. “He could have killed Penguin right there, in that place, and he did not.”

“Hmm.”

It’s her turn to frown. “I will not sit here while you talk of him like he is a feral beast.” She says, finally with some emphasis. “Victor has endured trauma before; he overcame then,” if to “overcome” is to completely abandon all notions of polite society and make one’s living in blood and decaying flesh, “and he will overcome again.”

_And at what cost_ , a voice whispers from her subconscious. He lost his parents, his world shattered, and he found solace in death and torture, in screams of anguish and rivers of blood. A physical trauma, such as this…what will happen? What will become of him? Dare she even think of it now?

“Do not want you with him.” Alexander presses. “You leave; you never come back alive.”

“No.” she says, firmly. “You are wrong. Victor loves me.”

She has to cling to it, to that one fragile truth. If she doesn’t, there is no remaining hope for her, for Victor, for anything and everything they’ve ever worked to build together. If she loses him…

No. She won’t think of it. Not now.

“You’re not usually so impulsive.”

Victor’s voice both soothes and grates her nerves, when he speaks from the doorway that was previously closed (and, she’s almost certain, locked). The former, because he’s barely spoken all night; the latter, because his voice sounds horrible, like a rabid animal might sound if given a voice to speak. The way his eyes look much too bright amidst heavy shadows doesn’t settle her anxiety, nor does it Alexander’s, from the way he steps forward in a protective stance.

Victor’s mouth twists unpleasantly. “You think you need to protect her?” he whispers, taking a slow step forward. “You think I’d hurt her?”

“No.” she says, quickly standing, but her words, if heeded, go ignored.

“You think she isn’t safe with me, is that it?” now, he’s practically growling, and she throws caution aside before she loses another family member to senseless violence.

“I am.” She insists, crossing the distance in short strides and enfolding herself in his presence. “I am always safe with my tiger.” Her hands rest on his chest. She always could soothe him with such a touch, even as a teenager. Let it still be true. _Please, God, let it be true._

Alexander still looks ready to fight, but— _Thank God_ —Victor releases a slow breath and drops his gaze to her face. His expression is empty, but the arm he locks around her waist makes the point in a pinching grip. “We’ll leave tomorrow.” He declares.

Tomorrow, when he’s on a plane surrounded by people and screaming babies and disobedient children, he’ll regret these words. Tonight, he makes his vow, and she intends to hold him to it. If only because it will avoid blood being spilled after one more night under a shared roof.


End file.
